Thirst For Romance
by blood red youth
Summary: The beginning of the should-have-been romance that never quite was. [A/L, set in Palace of the Damned.]
1. Chapter 1

Yeah I don't know why I'm beginning a new series when I have several unfinished. I was meaning to post this days ago but my laptop completely broke so I lost all my stuff, including the original of this. Very annoying.

Anyway, I think this will be a 6 or 7 part thing, all quite short chapters like this one. Hope someone's reading - and if you are, please review!

(Also thanks for your reviews on Lonely Hearts and Begin Again "Guest" - obviously I can't reply to thank you privately, but I really appreciated your comments :) Hopefully you'll read this sometime so you'll see this reply!)  
This takes up somewhere in Palace of the Damned, if you've read it you'll totally remember where I mean... but I don't have the book on me right now so I can't give any specific details. Anyway...

* * *

It didn't take long for Larten to see her again. It had been impossible to get Arra really talking the first time he'd seen her with Mika hovering around them, and in the end the two of them had retired before he'd managed to ask her anything about how exactly she'd left Evanna and ended up here.

Larten liked Mika well enough, though the two had never particularly been good friends, but he'd been left with the distinct impression that Mika was quite fond of his assistant and wasn't keen on her making many new _friends_ during Council. Mika couldn't have known that Larten hadn't even considered getting involved with another woman after Alicia and that he had no impure intentions toward Arra whatsoever. He had liked her when she'd been one of Evanna's assistants, but he knew very little else about her. He just wanted to talk to her – wanted to talk to her _a lot_, more than he could reasonably explain.

He had vowed to keep an eye open for her after their first encounter, and though she was easy to spot in a crowded Hall of males, she was almost never alone. Tonight she was sitting with Mika again, only a few tables away from him while he distractedly chatted to Seba.

"If you find yourself at a loose end," his old mentor was saying, noticing that Larten was no longer paying him any attention. "I would be grateful of some assistance in the run up to the Festival of the Undead. There is a lot of preparation to be done, and I am only one man."

It was Seba's first year as Quartermaster and he was right, making the necessary preparations was a monumental task. Larten wasn't really listening, though.

"Of course," he replied, watching as the dark General pushed his bowl aside as though he had finished with his meal. He swung his legs to the side, preparing to stand, and then for a few more minutes continued the conversation he was clearly having with his assistant. Larten watched with bated breath, eager to find the exact perfect time to approach her after her mentor left.

Seba scowled.

"You are willing to sacrifice all of your free time in order to assist, then?" he asked tactically. Larten was staring straight over his shoulder, craning his neck and clearly focusing entirely on something else. He was likely to say yes to anything in such a distracted state.

"Yes, Seba," he replied dully, as Mika finally stood to leave, eventually being cornered by a group of vampires before he escaped the Hall. How he found such a large amount of time to devote to chaperoning his assistant was a mystery when it seemed almost every vampire in the Mountain was eager to speak to him about the infamous Vampaneze negotiations.

"Would you like me to fetch you a bowl of bat broth, Larten?" Seba asked, as a final test, knowing that bat broth had always made his assistant sick.

"Yes, Seba," he replied predictably. For a few moments at least, she was sitting on her own. Noticing his eyes on her, she gave a nod to acknowledge him. She didn't smile, but he imagined she probably didn't very often. The nod was enough to convince him he probably wasn't unwelcome. He eagerly began the process of getting to his feet, but before he could Seba reached out to give him a pinch on the arm with his sharp nails.

"Ow!" the young General cried in surprise, looking down at the small scratch.

"You have not stopped looking once since we came in," Seba accused, unimpressed. "Leave the poor girl be."

Larten scoffed. "No, Seba, I _know_ her. She was one of Evanna's assistants once."

"What of it?" his mentor asked. "Plenty of those who know the Lady of the Wilds might have also stumbled upon her at one point or another."

Seba was being deliberately difficult. It was clear he felt it unacceptable that all new vampiresses were hounded by almost the entire male population of the Mountain, and wished to save this newcomer the trouble of refusing another.

"She remembers me, too," Larten convinced. Seba rolled his eyes.

"Regardless of your questionable interest in the girl," the older vampire said. "You have not listened to a word I have said. You have just agreed to spend every waking moment of the coming months assisting in the preparations for Council and asked for me to fetch you a bowl of bat broth."

Larten blushed, and finally focused completely on Seba. He was a grown man now and Seba was no longer his mentor, but he still found himself fearing possible punishment for his rudeness.

"I am not going to force you to eat the broth," Seba decided mercifully. Larten had convinced himself years ago that one night he would be capable of drinking the stuff, but each and every time he tried he was sick for days afterwards. It was a distinct possibility that he was allergic to bats, however ridiculous that seemed. "I am, however, going to insist that you follow through on your promise to assist an old friend."

Larten fought the urge to reveal his disappointment. There were certainly more interesting things to do with his time in the Mountain than source large amounts of ale and get hold of enough food to sustain a few hundred vampires for possibly several months.

"I would be delighted to help," he responded appropriately, not wanting to offend Seba further.

His old master laughed out loud at the blatant lie. "You can go and speak to your friend now, if you wish," he decided, feeling that the weeks of difficult tasks Larten had ahead of him might be punishment enough.

Larten immediately sprung to his feet again, but as he looked up, she was nowhere to be found.

Seba was chuckling again. "You know her, you say?" he asked knowingly, as his past assistant sat back down in front of him, defeated.

The old vampire smiled kindly. "I would not bother, if I were you," he suggested, studying Larten intently. The young General frowned and looked back at him quizzically.

"You wish to find someone else to focus on," Seba guessed. "Because you miss your human fiancée."

It had been almost a whole night since he'd last thought of her, and Larten wasn't happy to be reminded. Seba noticed his displeasure straight away.

"When I was a young man, there was a young vampiress with whom I was rather infatuated."

Larten started to chuckle. This was a story he and Wester had never heard before, and he had a feeling it might be good. It was useless trying to explain to Seba that he really didn't have any sort of untoward plans for Arra – the old man had already made up his mind and wouldn't be convinced otherwise.

"I cannot remember her name now, but I remember that I thought she was rather fascinating at the time. Unfortunately, I misunderstood the difference between a vampiress and an ordinary human girl. I thought I could charm her easily with gifts and begin to court her. She tired of my attempts at romance one night and challenged me to a fight, which I lost. Feeling that I was weak and soft, she gave me no more chances."

Though it sounded like it must have been annoying at the time, Seba smiled at the memory of his younger days.

"You will find the same thing with this young vampiress," he said. "It will be a lot of effort for very little in the way of a reward."

Larten rolled his eyes. Seba sometimes thought he knew everything, and most of the time he was right – but just this once, he'd got it all wrong.

"She is an old friend," he clarified, even though he'd only actually met her once. "You will not see me buying her chocolates and jewellery, I assure you."

Seba raised his eyebrows and shrugged, as though he was done trying to talk him out of it. He gathered himself to his feet and slipped his legs from under the bench, ready to continue with his daily duties again.

"I do not stare at old friends of mine like that," he said knowingly, and then scurried away before Larten could continue to argue with him about it.

The General sat by himself for a few moments after that, laughing to himself at the way Seba had spoken and lamenting how difficult it seemed to be to catch the young assistant alone at almost any time of night or day. It was all perfectly innocent, he reminded himself, but he would continue to search her out again anyway. That persistence hadn't anything to do with the memory of her grey eyes when they'd first met, or how she'd looked standing in the waterfall spray a few nights ago – nothing to do it _whatsoever_.


	2. Chapter 2

Their first real conversation came long after most vampires had retired for their cells for the day. Larten often had trouble sleeping, too often consumed with thoughts of his old life and those he'd left behind, and it seemed Arra was perpetually busy with her training and her ambitions. He had located her sipping from a mug of blood in a completely empty hall after sunrise on one of the nights he spent wandering the Mountain, lost in his thoughts and searching out some purpose.

At first, he could hardly believe his luck. It had been a couple of nights since he'd last seen her, and he'd begun to give up hope that their paths might cross again. She looked tired, dark circles around her eyes, but smiled anyway as he fetched some blood and joined her.

"Should you not be asleep?" he asked.

"Shouldn't you?" she fired back, drumming her long fingers on the wooden table restlessly. When he studied her it was as if her body was exhausted but her mind was still whirring; he knew the feeling well.

Rather than continue with pointless small talk about why either of them hadn't found it appropriate to go to their coffins earlier, Larten remembered the questions he had first wanted to ask her after realizing the human girl he'd met all those years ago was now a vampire herself.

"I told you that I wouldn't be an assistant to Evanna forever," she said, grinning, when he asked her. He had been left with the impression that she disliked being Evanna's servant when he'd first met her. "Eventually, I suggested it might be time I found my true path – and as soon as I said that, I think she knew exactly what I meant.

I was interested in vampires before you came, but the way you spoke of your life finally convinced me I was destined to become one myself. I'm not sure if Evanna knew that all along, or whether she could see that I was thinking it myself – but either way, she acted as though she had been waiting for me to leave for a long time, as though it was all planned out ahead of time."

Thinking about fate and destiny made Larten feel a bit nervous, and the way Arra's eyes narrowed as she told the story suggested that she felt the same. Evanna was a powerful sorceress, almost as powerful as Destiny himself, and the idea that she could see exactly what the future was for all of them regardless of their decisions was a bit unnerving.

"I eventually located a vampire I thought might be a suitable mentor," Arra continued. "I thought about looking for _you_, but I had a feeling you wouldn't have much use for an assistant."

That shocked him. He supposed he was old enough and experienced enough now to take an assistant of his own, but he didn't think he ever would. His experience of being a father figure to Gavner the way Seba had to him left him cold and made him feel as though he could never be much of a teacher or a father – besides that, he was hardly a role model.

He was suddenly very glad she hadn't invested much time in searching for him. He doubted any respect she had for him would have been left intact after finding him living the human high life in Paris.

"I didn't exactly see eye to eye with my mentor, though," she said bluntly. "In hindsight, it would probably have been better to search for longer for an appropriate vampire to learn from – but vampires are rare and difficult to locate for a human, even one who knows exactly what they're looking for."

Confused, Larten frowned. It seemed to him that she and Mika got along very well – and he was sure Mika thought so too.

"Not Mika," she clarified, sensing what he might have been about to say before he had the chance. "My first mentor and I argued almost constantly. He was an old man, and I felt he'd completely lost his zest for life and often encouraged him to fight again and prove himself."

Larten laughed. He could easily imagine how trying that might have been for a vampire on his last legs, but it was completely Arra.

"Eventually, we came to Council. I was eager to fight and learn, but my mentor was of no help in my training or my development. After a couple of months, Mika says that he noticed my potential and negotiated becoming my mentor instead.

Between you and me," she said, taking another sip of her drink and smirking. "I don't think there was much of a negotiation at all. The arrangement suited us all, and I haven't seen Luca since."

To Larten that seemed a bizarre way to find your feet as a vampire. He remembered how helpful and nurturing Seba had been to him as a younger man, and felt briefly sorry that Arra hadn't managed to form the same kind of bond with her mentor as he had with his. Still, it didn't look like it bothered her at all – it seemed as if she found the whole story quite amusing.

"You and Mika seem to get along well," he commented, slyly. She was a snippy little thing, proud and arrogant, but he still rather liked her. She was occasionally funny, with a sharp sense of humour that sometimes shocked him, and quite pretty in the low light with her flashing eyes – but he didn't intend to step on anyone's toes, let alone Mika's.

She hummed in response, studying him as though she knew his intentions. "We get along alright," she replied evenly.

"He is rather fond of you," Larten pushed ambitiously, wishing for some sort of hint.

She shrugged. "As are most mentors of their assistants, I'm led to believe."

She was playing games with him, but he didn't know why.

"You know what I mean," he pressed. "You do not seem quite as fond of your mentor as he does of you."

Arra smirked. "That's a rude kind of assumption to make," she remarked, but she wasn't angry. If anything, she looked like she was amused. He knew for sure now that she had figured out why he was asking, but he couldn't tell if she was pleased or just humouring him. "Mika's been very kind to me, and very useful too, and I think I'll probably miss his guidance and support when my time as an apprentice comes to an end."

He supposed that was half an answer, and the most he was likely to get – she was being evasive about this in a way she hadn't been about anything else she'd told him, but there was a glint in her eye that made him think that perhaps it was just her way of teasing him.

He opened his mouth to ask her another question, but she held up a hand.

"I'm not going to say anything more about it," she told him sharply, looking frustrated by his persistence. Her irritation was brief, though, and when he nodded she looked at him evenly again.

"Enough talk about me," she decided. "Why don't you tell me what you've been doing since your visit to Evanna's?"

Larten wasn't sure what he'd been expecting, but he hadn't actually anticipated having to tell her about his life much at all. He struggled suddenly for something to say. He could hardly begin to reveal all of his deepest and darkest secrets to Arra – practically a _stranger_ – when he could hardly even face them himself.

He wasn't the type to lie about anything though, and so for a long few moments he sat in silence, staring down at his hands and remembering everything. He could not mention Malora and the ship, Gavner, Alicia and Tanish – how could he really tell her honestly about locating the palace in the ice without mentioning anything of how he'd gotten there?

He wasn't ready to talk about Alicia yet, either, not even to Seba or Wester if they asked.

After another few long beats of silence, Arra coughed awkwardly.

"What, absolutely nothing to say?" she asked, brow furrowed in confusion. For a second it was almost like she was concerned about him, or concerned that she might have upset him, but when he remained silent for a few moments longer that shadow of empathy disappeared.

"I am sorry," he said, after such a long time had passed while he'd been lost in his thoughts that she was starting to look angry. He knew it was rude of him to avoid answering such a simple question when she had told him everything he wanted to know about her own history, but all his wounds were fresh still and it wasn't right to speak about any of it yet, let alone to this mysterious assistant. Could she be trusted? More important even than that, what would she think, what would she _say_?

Arra scowled. She looked taken aback by his complete change of attitude, and had clearly taken it as a personal insult – she was so highly strung that Larten imagined she probably took a variety of things as an insult.

She finished the last of her drink in one swift gulp and then sniffed and stood up.

"Doesn't matter anyway," she grumbled, betraying her youth in her childish response for once. "I'm going to bed."

He had waited too long to speak to her to have her leave thinking that he wasn't fond of her at all.

"Sit down," he implored. "I'd like to know more about what you've been doing at the Mountain before you go. How long have you been here? Did you go with Mika to watch the famous negotiations, or –"

"Another night," she interrupted sharply, still frowning. He knew that his avoidance looked shady, untrustworthy and downright bizarre, and didn't blame her for getting the wrong end of the stick. Defeated, he sighed and stared down at the table top again as she strode away.

Was this how it was always going to be from now on? That was a depressing thought, and Larten spent a long time thinking after she'd gone about how long he was going to allow his past to impact his present and his future. It was time to leave the problems he'd experienced behind, but that was easier said than done.

Even as he eventually retired to his cell to lie awake for the rest of the day, his mind was drawn back again to the fierce young vampiress he'd wished to charm as a younger man. Everything was behind him now, and if he wished to carve a new life for himself inside the boundaries of the Mountain at some point he would need to come to a sort of acceptance of everything that had happened and let go of it all. As he climbed into his coffin he resolved to find another way of charming the prickly assistant – preferably one that didn't involve too much more discussion of his past.


	3. Chapter 3

Larten thought a lot about Seba's warning. Despite the fact that he wasn't exactly doing well at charming her, he was stubborn by nature and didn't want to give up - and besides that, whenever he thought about just letting fate take its course, he remembered how much he was beginning to desire her. Whether it was that spark he reasoned had been between them all those years ago or just plain lust, it was almost impossible to keep his mind off of her.

Realizing that it wasn't going to be possible to forget about her, he decided it was time for more of a traditional approach. She might have been a vampire, but she was still a woman first - and in his experience no woman could resist the Quicksilver charm for long. He didn't imagine Arra was fond of any of the normal things he might have gifted to a human woman to trick them into bed, though – what use would she have for ill-gotten diamonds and gold, apart from to sell them herself?

It was for that reason that he found himself wandering outside the Mountain at dusk, just dark enough not to cause him any discomfort but light enough that he knew he wouldn't be disturbed. Seba had always loved nature, in all of its forms, and had imparted a lot of his knowledge about plants and flowers onto his assistants. If Seba liked nature, and he was as true a vampire as any, there was a chance Arra might too.

When he returned to the gate, hands pricked from digging through thorns and weeds for hours to rustle up a bouquet of questionable-looking flowers, Wester clutched his sides and dropped to his knees with laughter, which was almost enough to make him want to dump the whole lot of plants and start over. Proud as ever, though, Larten gave his pesky brother a swift kick in the ribs on his way past. He convinced himself that what Wester _didn't_ know about women could probably fill several volumes, and set off in search of Arra, picking particularly nasty thorns out of the wild roses as he walked.

He left some of them on purpose because it seemed so appropriate. She was very much the rose with the thorns, the flower surrounded by the weeds, and rather than offend her he thought that comparison might make her laugh.

He eventually located her sparring with an opponent he didn't recognize in one of the Games Halls. She darted around him gracefully, trying to confuse and distract him with her speed. For a few minutes it looked like she had the beating of him, getting almost all of her hits in while he was unable to catch onto her. She was barely more than a girl if he looked at her long enough, and she was still a new enough vampire that she was limber and long-legged, slender and feminine rather than bulky and muscular like her more experienced opponent.

Larten didn't doubt that she was probably an awful lot stronger than she looked, but it was distinctly uncomfortable when her opponent finally bested her. That wasn't how she would have liked him to think about it, he realized, but watching her opponent ball up his huge fist and smash it into her jaw was wrong somehow. Maybe he had been living as a human too long.

Her opponent had not been malicious in his attempts to knock her down, simply clinical. Larten watched as he reached down to help her to her feet after Vanez called the match to an end, and noticed the way she rejected his hand and clambered to her feet herself with difficulty instead.

He had been so interested in watching her fight and the aftermath that he hadn't noticed until that moment the bizarre looks directed at him from the others who had gathered to watch her. Mika, who had been on his way forwards presumably to assist her, noticed him and smirked.

Larten expected some sort of disagreement between them then, but instead Mika's smirk remained firmly in place. Larten could feel himself blushing, and he knew Mika must have seen his intentions, but the black-garbed General simply shrugged and held out a hand to allow him to go first. There was a moment of confusion – perhaps he'd been wrong about Mika's intentions altogether and secretly he actually approved of Arra finding herself a mate? He looked back once to check, but Mika was still smirking infuriatingly.

It was only as he reached the ring and came to a stop next to her that he realized this might not have been an entirely appropriate time for courtship. Her nose was streaming blood and her jaw was already swelling. She turned around to look at him and she looked angry too – he ought to have guessed that she would be a bit of a sore loser.

It was too late to back out now, though, and so he held out the flowers for her with a grimace. He had a feeling, from the dark look in her eyes, that she was more likely to break his arms than kiss him. There was a long pause and Larten resisted the urge to close his eyes in fear of the oncoming storm.

"What is this?" she asked, sounding every bit as irritated as he'd hoped she wouldn't be. Her voice was barely above a growl, and now Mika's apparent display of good sportsmanship made perfect sense – he had been looking forward to her shooting him down for his foolishness.

"Flowers," he responded, holding them out to her again, trying to sound confident and sure of himself. "They are for you."

This was so humiliating. What had he expected? They didn't have much in the way of an audience, but even the few vampires around them were starting to laugh.

The silence continued, and her glare quickly became too much for him to deal with so he cleared his throat awkwardly to break the tension. "Good fight," he added pointlessly, unnecessary when she was still grimacing in pain.

She took his bunch of flowers without looking at them only to shove them back at him. It was as if for some reason she thought this was every bit as humiliating for her as it was for him, by the way she was blushing. He caught most of them as she pressed them back into his chest, but some of the petals fluttered to the floor and some caught on his shirt.

"No _thank you_," she spat viciously, looking practically _outraged_ that he'd dared bring her a gift, before turning away from him to retrieve a bandage from Vanez. Though he reached out again to tap her on the shoulder to try and get her attention or assure her that he had only meant the gesture to be a kind one, she simply brushed him off and faced away again.

He supposed, thinking about it, that it might have been embarrassing for her too, in front of all of these older Generals that she wished to impress. He hadn't meant to humiliate her, but he could see how he had done. There was nothing he could say now in front of everyone else that would make her feel better, and before he could Mika – his large shoulders shaking as he chuckled – swept past him to offer to help her back to her cell.


End file.
